GLENN KAHL/The Bulletin

Watts Equipment Company is one of the many firms that has stepped up to the plate to support the efforts of the Second Harvest Food Bank in Manteca’s Industrial Park.

Food Bank CEO Mike Mallory has nothing but gratitude for Watts’ efforts and those of its president Shirley Perreira in supplying commercial forklifts and their needed parts and service at his Industrial Park Drive location in Manteca that feeds the hungry in both San Joaquin and Stanislaus counties.

Watts Equipment is a unique organization in the material handling industry that recently moved to its new 24,000-square-foot quarters on Comconex Drive, north of Highway 120, east of Manteca from a cramped location on Moffat Boulevard. Their open house was held on May 13 at their new three acre site.

“She does what she says she is going to do,” Mallory said of the president of the firm. “She is on our board and has done phenomenal things for us from fork lift donations to food. They have donated electric lifts every year in addition to forklifts. They give us a good deal on the cost of service and she also sponsors our events – Watts has been very good to us.”

Shirley Perreira said much has changed within the company since its founding by Virgil Watts in 1967 who stayed involved in the day-to-day operation well into his 80s. Perreira joined the company 20 years later in 1987, fresh out of college.